Office of the Chief of Naval Operations to Vice Admiral William S. Sims, Commander, United States Naval Forces Operating in European Waters

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OPERATIONS

Sept. 13, 1918.

VICE ADMIRAL SIMS

OPNAV 1445 Your 4254 and 42941 (B-1) Twenty percent spare engines not considered sufficient to maintain planes in operations perios<d> Total one thousand two hundred sixteen Navy Liberty engines shipped to seaboard to go abroad up to seventh Sept. period For disposition of excess engines see our seventy-nine seventy-eight2 period Agreement with War Department is that all Navy type Liberty Engines in excess of needs for naval aircraft will be turned over to War Department for allocation to allies allocation to be decided upon after considering all requests from allies and if in order to obtain best combined results period Army needs for any land machines available must be considered period Confer with Assistant Secretary of War Ryan3 now abroad who is familiar with requests of allies for motors and needs of Army for land machines perios<d> Department desires to confine its aviation activities to purely Naval work 13013 1445